Pittsburgh High Voltage suffers fire yesterday

High Voltage Insulator

Plant to Resume

In Full at Once

Derry (Special) January 30, 1918 —

Undismayed by the fire which wiped out all but the main part of their plant the officials of the Pittsburgh High Voltage Insulator company worked yesterday and all last night in making plans for a bigger and better factory. Architects were called in consultation and worked on the plans throughout the night. This morning the plans ware about ready for final approval and before the week is out the work of putting up new, better and bigger buildings to replace those destroyed will be under way.

The plant in using all the employes who can get to work today. On account of the street car tie-up soma of the employes could not get to the plant today, but it is expected that the car line will be open by tomor­row morning. Arrangements are being made by which the production of the plant will be up to normal again before the end of this week. All em­ployes are asked to come to work tomorrow if they can reach the plant in any way, as they will be needed, and can be used regularly.

About 70 per cent of the present out­put of the plant is on government orders, and representatives of the United States Government and officials of the P. R. R. are are cooperating with the officials of the Pittsburgh High Voltage Insulator company in endeavoring to get production up to normal before this week out.

Investigation has failed to determine the cause of the fire which started in the cooper shop. The of­ficials of the plant are very outspoken in their condemnation of the West­moreland Water company. The destruction of the plant is blamed by Insulator officials directly to the fail­ure of the water company to provide proper pressure.

It has been determined that the Grinnell sprinkler system worked perfectly and was not frozen up as one wild story started, said. It has been proven that all the sprinkler heads let go but the water only dripped out instead of shooting out with force as it should have done.

Only because of the help rendered the the P. R. R. in filling engines with water and turning its full pipe line pressure of 80 pounds on the fire was the main structure saved, in the opin­ion of Insulator officials. They speak in highest terms of the service rendered by the Derry Fire company, the men furnished by the P. R. R., the citizens of the town, who, together with employes of the Insulator plant, formed a monster fire fighting gang which struggled valiantly to stay the ravages of the flames when the water supply failed.

The Pittsburgh High Voltage Insu­lator company wishes to express its gratitude to these fire fighters and to any others who helped in any way in saving the main part of the plant.

New electrical equipment to replace that destroyed in the fire is now on the way to Derry. It has been pro­cured from Newark, N. J., Philadel­phia and Pittsburgh and will be avail­able. as soon as the rush shipment arrives. Packing and other material to replace that destroyed in the fire has been ordered and is now being rushed to Derry. Temporary packing space has been provided and the plant will soon be on a normal working basis which will be maintained until the new and larger addition is completed.